How to Help Military & Veteran Families: Some Answers to Your Questions

Every community in America is home to veterans and/or service members and their families. Communities and advocacy groups support our troops through various efforts. Now, targeted resources are available for professionals and community groups that are motivated to help those who have served our nation.

Through collaborative efforts of the U.S. Departments of Defense and Agriculture and the National Military Family Association, the Military Family Research Institute at Purdue University has created an 11-part series of “How to Help” publications. These publications provide a wealth of information for medical and legal professionals, neighbors, faith-based organizations, teachers, and others seeking to help veterans, service members and their families. Each issue is filled with evidence-based guidance. You can find the first issues at https://www.mfri.purdue.edu/publications/how-to-help.aspx.

Representatives from the Military Family Research Institute, DoD, and USDA will provide additional information about the How to Help series and how Cooperative Extension and other community leaders may use these evidence-based guidance publications within your communities.

Additional resources that were shared during the webinar are:
* Military Kids: Caring to Learn, Learning to Care is an eight-part webinar series that offers unique topic sessions especially for child care providers. Supported by MFRI, Purdue Extension, and Operation: Military Kids, this free series helps identify, better understand and support military children and families in their child care setting. Eligible participants can receive 1 continuing education unit from Purdue for a cost of $15. Topics include military culture, working with military families and the impact of deployment on children. https://www.eventreg.purdue.edu/ec2k/Heading.asp?heading_id=553

This is the first in a series of webinars to learn more about the How to Help publications.

The presenters are: Joyce Wessel Raezer of the National Military Families Association, Brent Elrod of USDA-NIFA, Eddy Mentzer of Department of Defense, and Shelley MacDermaid Wadsworth of the Military Family Research Institute--Purdue University.

4 Comments

Dear Joel, Thank you so much for attending our first webinar and for your feedback. We are looking forward to providing you with details about specific topics in upcoming webinars. In the meantime, we will be adding what we hope will be helpful links and blog posts to supplement the introductory information. Thanks again for attending and we hope to see you at the next webinar.
-- MFRI